Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Palousitics 2008 Presidential Straw Poll

For those of you unable to make this Sunday's WCRP Lincoln Day Dinner, I thought it would be fun to gauge conservative opinion here in Pullman/Whitman County/Washington on next year's wide-open Republican Presidential horserace. I figure if you're going to vote for Hillary or Obama, you aren't likely to be reading this blog anyway. Besides, another Clinton in the White House and I'm heading for Greenland. I understand the real estate potential is growing there.

I have found myself getting more and more interested as various candidates have officially declared their candidacy over the past few weeks.

On the right, you can see a new poll that I created. Please take a moment and vote. The results, of course, will be totally unscientific, but please, you partisans in particular, try not to abuse/manipulate it too badly. Feel free to post comments about your choice or to discuss candidates.

This site is a great reference for all known and potential Republican candidates.

13 comments:

After reading the link you gave, there are several people on there I wouldn't mind and some of there I would not want. I hate to base thing on one issue, but in some cases when you have several people who are about equal, you have to look at single issues. I found one person was against the death penality, that is something that you will lose my vote over. I call myself very conservative, but many times I am hardcore libertarian. I like the idea of many libertarian principles. And many times conservatives and libertarians overlap, even if the reasoning for the overlap is different.

But from that list of people several of them were not on Tom's list to choose from.

I think that if someone who is electable takes up Michael Savages "Borders, language, and culture" idea he would go a long way to getting my vote.

Savage and I don't see eye to eye on everything, but his basic message of borders, language, and culture is right on.

Well for me I have had it with RINO's like MaCain & Rudy, those two take a leap as far as I concerned, I will vote Constitution Party person before I vote for one of those two. Yes I know that will almost a sure us of a Clinton in the Whitehouse. At least we will know that we are getting screwed. IF Mike Huckabee was able to make it onto the ballot, I would be very happy. Scotty & Tom I to would like to see any of them pick up Savage's message of borders, language, and culture.

If you remember, I had the chance to hear Governor Huckabee speak last year at the Wal-Mart Media Conference. He is folksy, articulate and charismatic.

I share Huckabee's faith (Southern Baptist) and values. He is a Southerner, which is a big plus. Look at the map from the last two elections. Any Republican that hopes to win next year must carry the South whole the way Bush did. I'd be very suprised if Giuliani or Romney could even carry their very Blue home states of New York and Massachusetts.

I wish he were a little more rock ribbed on Iraq, like Giuliani and McCain. But in his defense, he didn't deal with foreign policy in Arkansas.

Huckabee has a great personal story that I can also relate to. He lost over 100 pounds and has run in several marathons. He has befome a national advocate for healthy living. But creating mandatory weigh-ins for school kids as part of a "health report card" maybe strays a little too much into nannyism for me. A kid's weight should be the parent's responsibility, not the state.

Huckabee has also been criticized by both the Cato Institute and the Club for Growth for raising taxes and increasing government in Arkansas. But hearing Huckabee defend Wal-Mart against rabid liberal reporters last year told me all I need to know about how he feels about free enterprise.

I like Rudy Guiliani except he may be a little too libertarian for me. For instance, I disagree with his gay marriage position. He seems to be view it as an individual's choice, which it is, until it starts breaking down society. I am still learning about the different candidates and the only one I would completely rule out is John McCain.

I certainly respect Giuliani's leadership abilities and his actions after 9/11. In many ways, I think he would make a great President. His social stances, however, would alienate much of the base, which any Republican candidate will need next year more than ever. While his public character is unassailable, his private life has been a train wreck of divorces, affairs, and touches of scandal (his father was a Mafia enforcer and remember Bernard Kerik, the former NYPD chief?) that make Bill Clinton look like a choir boy.

Again, I have great respect for McCain and he is a true war hero in every sense of the word. I appreciate his straight talk. But he does appear to flip flop on the issues quite a bit and his political expediency has made many enemies in Republican circles. I think the McCain-Feingold Act is a real disaster as well as McCain's attempts to restrict other political speech.

This may sound strange, but with all of Rudy's imperfections, he seems human and American. As an imperfect human and American, I can relate. I really, really want a Ronald Reagan type leader and Rudy is as close as I have seen. I am probably wrong, I was wrong about George Bush (both, but I am still hoping.

At least he would be in the news! If Anna Nichole Smith was running for president, she'd be elected on name recognition alone. We are not living in the same time as when candidates needed to be squeaky clean. We are now living at a time when Oprah break-downs demonstrate sensitivity and time in re-hab is a plus. Presidents are now competing against celebrities and we may as well accept it.

I've heard comments coming from various corners that Giuliani's apparent social stances may not be what we'll get from him were he to be put in the Oval Office. In short, I've heard many commentators point out that Giuliani had to get himself elected twice in New York City as a Republican. That is going to require some rhetorical compromise in every instance.

And my thoughts on McCain are similar to what others have said here, that he flip-flops too much for my tastes. I read over some of his website, but I pretty much stopped when I came across positions that amounted to "we'll cut spending without cutting any spending." Sorry, no dice.

Tom - no pop ups this morning, and that was before I saw your note that I should clear my cache. Maybe the pest is gone.